Union Ministers AK Antony, Ghulam Nabi Azad and P Chidambaram meet DMK chief M Karunanidhi at his residance in Chennai on Monday to bridge diffrences between the government and their Tamil ally DMK, over the issue of voting on Sri-Lanka in UN.

NEW DELHI: The government has failed to convince DMK chief M Karunanidhi that it will be difficult for India to back a UN resolution that seeks international probe into the Sri Lankan conflict and which declares civilian deaths in the island nation as genocide.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's emissaries — AK Antony, P Chidambaram and Ghulam Nabi Azad — met the chief of the Tamil Nadu-based constituent of the Congress-led UPA on Monday, a day after he threatened to pull out of the ruling coalition at the Centre over the issue. "I have conveyed to the ministers that the government should insist on an international probe into the genocide. The resolution should declare that Sri Lanka was committing war crimes," agency reports quoting Karunanidhi said, adding that the three ministers, would convey his demands to the prime minister.

A DMK leader, who did not wish to be quoted, said the party might decide in favour of a graded disengagement with UPA. "We could withdraw our ministers from the government at the Centre as a first step of disengagement," said the leader, adding that with the Lankan Tamil issue finding traction the party feared that continued association with Congress could render it vulnerable to an onslaught by the ruling AIADMK.

"Congress' is banking on Dayanidhi Maran to save the alliance. But Maran is unlikely to succeed," the leader added. The Centre, meanwhile, has called India's envoy in Geneva for consultations on the UN resolution. "We will have consultations on the matter, and he (Indian envoy to Geneva) will be able to brief senior officials on the ground level realities in Geneva and the latest position," an MEA spokesman said.